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Monday, August 16, 2010

MiM Mailbag: First intro to medicine

first of all i want to say i love all of your stories. they inspire me to go through school and achieve what each and every one of you have achieved.

i have connections to a hospital and was told that i could shadow a doctor. i was given pretty much free reign as far as my choice and i'm supposed to tell them what i'm interested in and they will arrange who i shadow by what i tell them.

well, i'm interested in obstetrics...but i have a feeling that might be kind of awkward to shadow. other than that i have no real preference.

so my question to all of you lovely ladies is this: what area of medicine do you think would give me the best experience? this would be my first intro to medicine and i want to pick something that would be a positive experience and that would be able to show me a basic "day in the life of".

I think if you are interested in OB - go shadow an OB! As a medical student, nothing got me more excited about medicine than taking part in childbirth. It made me want to be an OB. For a month. Then I came back to my senses:)

I would say do what you are interested and OB is a good choice because you have clinic with acute issues and long term follow up. You will have a little taste of surgery and or emergency care. Also depending on where you are a good Family practice gives you a good look at Medicine.

The first time I shadowed it was an OB/Gyn. I was worried that a lot of patients wouldn't let a student come in the room, by nature of the specialty and that I live in a very conservative area. But I was wrong. I shadowed for 9 hours (her office hours) and I was only told no by two patients, one who was just about to get married and was very shy, and another who was coming in for a follow up after delivering a stillborn. So I understood why both cases wouldn't want an extra person in there. But plenty of the women, especially those that have had multiple children don't care if one more medical personal takes a peek.

I would definitely do it to make sure you like OB. I was worried that I would get bored in the day from the same repetitive OB visits. But there was a lot more variety than I expected. The patients were all at different stages, so it was different, and each patient's personality made every visit unique, and then all the different gynecological problems made for a very interesting day.

I agree OB/GYN is a great specialty to shadow because you really are exposed to all kinds of medicine. Its really amazing to be part of the birth of a child!! Otherwise I shadowed an ER doc who ended up writing my LOR for med school and I still love all the amazing things I got to see!

You are so LUCKY to have such an opportunity -- where ever you are! In Canada, at least in a large city like Vancouver, it's almost impossible to even get a volunteer clinical position with meaningful patient contact, not to mention shadowing physicians. Enjoy.

Ob would provide a great combination of clinical info, give you some insight into good bedside manner and how to develop rapport with patients, and maybe you could even practice taking the patient's history. I think it's a great choice, especially if you are interested in it anyway.

Mothers in Medicine is a group blog by physician-mothers, writing about the unique challenges and joys of tending to two distinct patient populations, both of whom can be quite demanding. We are on call every. single. day.

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